Santa Rosalia

SANTA ROSALIA

Young Rosalia lived in the twelfth century in the era when Federiciana beaten the Arabs, the Normans arrived, and was rekindled in Sicily religious fervor, were built Basilian monasteries and Benedictine.

Rosalia, according to legend, was a girl of noble family who refused the marriage proposed by his father and preferred to take refuge in the Basilian monastery in Palermo, but frequent visits moved her to take refuge in a cave in the possessions of his father.
He led a solitary life in the cave, now incorporated in the hermitage dedicated to her in the woods of Quisquina, over Bivona, the necropolis of Realtavilla (AG), where he stayed for 12 years.
So he returned briefly to his father's house, in the district Olivella, Palermo, and then go to his final resting place on Montepellegrino, where rifuggiò in a cave full of water.
Here lived another eight years and died September 4, 1165.

During the great plague of 1624 a hunter climbed the cliff to commit suicide after the loss to plague his wife had a vision, it seems that Rosalia appeared
has pointed to the place where they were buried his bones and asked him to bring them in procession to the city to free her from the plague.
On June 9, 1625 during the procession partecipatissima bones of Santa Rosalia in the singing of the "Te Deum Laudamus" the sick healed by the plague.
Rosalia became the patron saint of the city of Palermo and Pope Urban VIII in 1630 included in the Roman Martyrology.

Today we celebrate the 14 to 15 July and 4 September.